Installment #11--Sunday Showers

Not having any water at the IC house on Saturday can make a person go a little crazy after playing six or seven games of volleyball under the African sun. Not having water on Sunday either is just plain torture. I spent most of the morning Sunday writing, went into town at about 11:30 to take some lunch with a few of the other teachers, ran to the internet café and was back to the IC house by about 2:00. Mary, from Kampala, was scheduled to come by the house at 2:00. Mary makes beads out of old magazines and newspapers and creates necklaces and bracelets out of them. They are similar to the “beads for life” bracelets and necklaces, but are a microfinance project that Mary runs. In perfect Ugandan punctuality, Mary showed up at about 2:45. We took our time perusing her wares, and many people bought many necklaces. At about 3:30, as we were finishing our perusing, the skies opened up! Not having had a shower for a little over a week, and not having bathed for two days (after mucho sweaty volleyball), I ran back into the house, grabbed a towel and some soap, and ran back outside. Stripped to my skivvies, I nestled in under a corner of the roof that funnels water in a sizeable stream providing a very cold, but very refreshing shower. If you look around enough, there are a few pictures of me out there.

After my very refreshing shower, the IC car was by in short order to pick us up. We made our trip out to Pabo in a Matatu. The suspension on a matatu is something to be witnessed, as are the roads. The number of potholes, bumps, and ruts in the road to Sudan, and the severity of the bumps are amplified tremendously in a matatu, and your rear end feels every one. The trip in a matatu takes about an hour and a half, and Trisha, Danielle, and I were all happy that it was over. When we got back to the White House, Charles was waiting outside on the porch. I went in, unpacked, and went outside to meet Charles. We talked for a bit, I went in and had dinner, and then the girls and I talked a bit more in the evening.